Ensoniq SQ-80

The SQ-80 is basically a reved-up ESQ-1
with a total of 75 waveforms, a 61-note keyboard with velocity &
aftertouch, floppy disk drive for storing patches and sequences, and an
enhanced sequencer. Great for organs, analog-type sounds, pads and sound
effects. Like the classic ESQ-1, the SQ-80 functions in providing
analog-type 4-pole lowpass filtering and editing of digital waveforms.
Each voice can combine up to 3 of the 75 waveforms. These waveforms
include multi-sampled transient attack waves such as violin bow,
plectrum picks, mallet, hammer, breath attacks and percussive sounds.
There are also 5 sampled drum sets. Three LFOs are onboard for some
pretty wild modulation of the sounds you create or edit. Complete MIDI
implementation makes the SQ-80 great for any studio or live use too.

As for playing the SQ-80, it is a dream! Its 61-note keyboard is full,
responsive and has polyphonic aftertouch. Polyphonic aftertouch simply
means that each key pressed will respond to aftertouch independently of
the other keys. The aftertouch can be used to control a variety of
modulation parameters such as the LFO. Pitch and mod wheels and plenty
of front-panel buttons and a few sliders make accessing and editing
fairly easy and hands-on. The keyboard can be split or layered. The
pattern-based 8-track multitimbral sequencer is great for creating short
to complex sequences live, or in step time with quantization,
bounce-able tracks, 60 sequence patterns and 20 songs. And they can be
saved to disk along with any patches you've created and any SysEx Midi
data. Unfortunately, the SQ-80 has no built-in effects. The SQ-80 is
certainly a classic analog/digital hybrid of the late eighties which
still holds up well today. It has been used by filmaker/composer John
Carpenter.

The link above will take you to an eBay search for this synth to see active listings with more images, specs and information. If you don't find it there, try looking in our forum marketplace. Our marketplace gets thousands of visits every week so make sure to check back often if you want to buy or sell a synth.

So I bought an SQ-80 sometime back in March. Tried to load some sysex info into it (after I changed it to accept sysex data) and both times it has resulted in completely f**king the thing up... | Read more...